


wasteland, baby!

by villagepsychic



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Apocalypse, Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Study, Established Relationship, M/M, Melancholy, Minor Character Death, Non-Linear Narrative, Post-Apocalypse, Relationship Study, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-22
Updated: 2019-10-22
Packaged: 2020-12-27 03:41:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21112082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/villagepsychic/pseuds/villagepsychic
Summary: The moon is so close to the sun in the sky that it could kiss it a good morning if it so wished. The waves crash on the shore, and Felix says, "Things will never go back to normal, will they?""Mm," Dimitri hums, hooking his chin over Felix's shoulder. "Probably not, but that's fine. We've found a home, haven't we?"(Alternatively, the world ended four years ago, but Dimitri and Felix are only just beginning.)





	wasteland, baby!

**Author's Note:**

> me: bro... what if felix & dimitri accidentally kissed and the world was ending...  
friend: you're opening a google doc for this aren't you  
me, opening a gdoc: What? Of Course Not

_ all the fear and the fire of the end of the world / happens each time a boy falls in love with a girl / happens grace, happens sweet / happily, i’m unfazed here too _

**+1463**

The chasm has widened considerably over the past week.

It’s almost admirable, Dimitri thinks with a wry smile as Felix walks up to the edge and glares down at the bottomless pit as if it personally offended him. Just last Thursday, it had been a small sinkhole, and now… although, he realizes, maybe it’s been more than a week. He doesn't really pay attention to what day it is anymore. 

The sun beats down on them like a punishment even through the cold but there still isn’t enough light to see down to the bottom, so they’ve all gone with the assumption that there isn’t one. It’s also why a spark of protective worry sparks through Dimitri’s fingertips when Felix leans forward a little further just to spit in it and watch the wad of saliva fall with an irritable frown on his face. There’s still a string of spit connected to his bottom lip, and Dimitri watches with some sort of detached sort of interest as he frustratedly wipes it off with the sleeve of his jacket.

“Careful,” Dimitri warns, and Felix cranes his neck back to glare at him.

“I don’t need you to worry about me.”

His voice is raspy because he’s just woken up. His hair is loose and falls over his shoulders and down his back. Dimitri had to drag him out of bed for once instead of the other way around, after Ashe and Cyril came across the black mass during their scouting shift and came back to report to them. 

Dimitri shakes his head. “You don’t need me to worry about you. I _ want _ to worry about you.”

They’ve had this same fragment of a conversation so many times that Felix deigns to respond, choosing to roll his eyes and step away from the chasm anyway.

Dimitri supposes the most peculiar thing about the sinkhole-turned-monster-abyss is that it is perfectly round and not a crack is in sight. By now, the ground across the continent has weakened enough to threaten to fall out underneath one’s feet if they stand too close to the edge of something, and yet the ground here holds strong and dry from lack of rain or proper moisture. He pulls Felix away by the edge of his dark jacket anyway, ignoring the younger boy’s hiss of annoyance. “If it grew this fast, then we should probably be worried,” he murmurs.

“We should, shouldn’t we,” Felix sighs. He looks so uncharacteristically exhausted, and it sends a pang through Dimitri’s chest. 

“We can think about it later,” he says.

Felix turns to him, caramel eyes glimmering in the sharp sunlight. “We probably shouldn’t,” he says slowly. “The next time we wake up, we’ll probably be at the bottom of that thing.”

Weariness fills Dimitri and makes him feel rooted to the ground. “We need to move.”

“I don’t want to,” Felix breathes, staring at some point beyond Dimitri. He wonders if, after all these years, Felix still can’t make eye contact with him. The thought amuses him in a twisted, ugly sort of way. “Not when we’ve just…”

“We’ll pack up,” Dimitri says, taking Felix’s cold hands in his own. “We’ll tell everyone at noon. They won’t mind. They’ve done this for far too long to care.”

“That doesn't mean I don’t want them to care,” Felix mutters glumly, but he lets Dimitri wrap him up in his arms for a moment anyway. Dimitri understands.

The air is silent. When Dimitri looks up, his good eye gravitates to the moon involuntarily. It hangs low in the sky, so close he feels claustrophobic. The moon has been bigger than the sun for the past four years, threatening to crash into them. The moon played a cruel trick on the promise the earth made the sun, and so the world ended.

Ashe has a guarded look on his face when Dimitri and Felix find their way back to their makeshift home. Felix doesn't even spare him a glance as he ducks into the tent he shares with Dimitri, leaving him to explain everything to Ashe. “Did you figure out what it was?” He asks hopefully.

Dimitri purses his lips. “We don’t even know where it came from. It’s probably—just another effect of what happened.”

“It’ll keep getting bigger, then,” Ashe says, the corners of his mouth turning downwards. “Should we be packing up? It’s still an hour’s journey on walk, but—”

“We should be careful,” Dimitri says carefully. “We’ll talk about it over lunch today. Is everyone here?”

Ashe looks away. The place they’ve been settling down in is an area that hasn’t been ruined by the moon’s wrath just yet. There’s a freshwater spring nearby that doesn't need much boiling to be drinkable despite the erupting volcanoes, and it sits on top of a plateau just off the city outskirts. When they found it after hours of traveling with their bikes and old, now broken-down cars, Dimitri had finally felt a sense of peace. No one else was nearby, and it was quiet, tranquil.

That was only two weeks ago. Now this chasm—the abyss opening up and gradually inching towards them—seems to only be pulling apart the shallow fragments of respite they’d hopelessly been building up, and the worst part of it is the fact that Dimitri can’t find a logical reason as to _ why _ it’s there. The perfect shape, the lack of cracks around the edges, the way it seems to be utterly bottomless—the uneasiness makes Dimitri fidget as Ashe says, “Everyone’s here except for Dedue and Petra. They’re out on watch. Should I call them?”

Dimitri eyes the camp. Despite the bright sun, a rarity in itself, it’s still cold enough for everyone to huddle inside their tents. He spots Lysithea and Cyril talking in low voices, Cyril’s eyes occasionally darting over to Dimitri, and he lifts his hand up in polite greeting. And then he thinks about Felix and how he’s probably stewing over everything by himself in their tent. “Don’t call them,” he decides. “We’ll wait for them to come back.”

Ashe’s gray eyes swim with a buzzing sort of energy. “Alright. I’m gonna go check on them anyway.”

Dimitri gives him a faint smile. “You go do that.”

When he ducks into their tent, Felix is lying down, eyes closed and his arms behind his head. The lantern’s light is dim, painting his face in haunting oranges and shadows. He doesn't open his eyes when Dimitri sits down at his feet. “Felix.”

“What,” Felix says, voice monotone.

“I’m here for you,” he says. It’s his way of asking Felix, _ Are you okay? Do you need anything?_, because they’ve given up on asking if the other is okay by now. Or maybe it’s just an _ I love you_, but that isn’t the point. Neither of them are okay. No one here staying at their camp is. No one left on Earth is okay, because they’ve all had to watch their friends and relatives die under the pressure of the moon, whether it be by high tides or volcanoes or by cold or pollution or by the cruel, frantic actions from people looking to survive. What a depressing thought. Dimitri pushes it out of his head in favor of focusing on Felix’s form, the way his lips twitch into a frown, how his chest rises and falls as he breathes.

It’s silent for a moment. “I know,” Felix says eventually. He cracks an eye open to gaze at Dimitri. “The same for you, I guess.”

Dimitri lets himself smile. That’s really Felix’s way of saying _ I love you too_. He lets Dimitri pushes his legs apart and settle himself in between them but not without sneering at him. “What?” Dimitri asks innocently.

“Gonna fuck me before we have to tell everyone that we gotta move again?” Felix says a little mockingly, a little bitterly as Dimitri leans over him to press a kiss to his forehead, brushing away the few strands of hair that managed to escape the tie he’d put it up into as soon as they got back. He doesn't push him away when he does that either, so it’s a green light to settle his hands on his waist and bump their noses together lightly.

“Wasn’t gonna,” Dimitri murmurs, “but now that you’ve mentioned it…”

Felix scoffs and then looks him in the eyes, warm gaze so intense it makes his breath hitch. If Felix notices it, he doesn't say a word. “You’re pathetic.”

“For you, I am,” Dimitri admits easily, and Felix rolls his eyes. He pulls him into a kiss right afterwards anyway, so Dimitri doesn't think much of it.

**-94**

Felix’s birthday falls two months and three days before an asteroid crashes into the moon and forces it closer to the Earth.

There are speculations going around that the asteroid, named Artemis after the Greek goddess of the moon and the hunt, is too big for the moon to withstand its impact, but humans will be humans and no one really cares except for the scientists frantically running simulations and reporting to news anchors about it. Dimitri’s eighteen years old and can feel his throat closing up just thinking about it, so he pushes it out of his mind.

Felix gets a surprise party courtesy of Annette, Sylvain and Ingrid. They all jump out from behind couches and suspiciously angled doors as soon as Felix steps into Sylvain’s house under the guise of studying for a physics test, and he jumps back and squeaks so loud no one stops teasing him about it for the rest of the night. Felix claims he hates surprise parties, or just parties in general, but accepts the food Dedue and Ashe make with a small, grateful smile. He lets Dimitri hug him so tight he has to tap out, too. The world ending really does have a certain effect on everyone.

The only consistent thing about this, Dimitri thinks, are his feelings for Felix. But maybe that’s changing too, amidst the rising tensions of a possibly catastrophic event drawing nearer, but Felix doesn't give him the chance to think about it once they actually start to study. There’s birthday cake on his cheek and it makes the younger boy’s glare all the more endearing, which Dimitri both hates and loves in equal measure. “What are you looking at?” He demands, and Dimitri reaches out to thumb the bright blue icing off his face, oblivious to the way Felix jerks back and turns red and then blames it on the heaters being up too high. Afterwards, they go for a walk in their neighborhood and sit out at the lake’s edge. 

It almost feels like romance, like true young love, and Dimitri lets himself believe it. He is eighteen years old and so is Felix, and they hold hands and kiss for the first time underneath the full moon’s almost unnaturally bright glow. There were no stars out that night. That should have been their first warning.

_ all the things yet to come are the things that have passed / like the holding hands, like the breaking of glass / like the bonfire that burns, at all worth in the fight fell too _

**+1464**

They end up pushing back The Announcement to the next day, because Dimitri likes to take his _ time _ and it was already pretty clear that Felix wanted to push it back as far as possible anyway. It’s a freezing morning, gray-ish snowflakes falling as they gather around the commons clearing, hoods up and masks on even though it’s the middle of July, according to Annette and Ashe, the only people who bother to keep a calendar. They try to stay outside as little as possible on days like these, but this is a necessary evil.

Felix sits silently next to him, covered from head to toe. “I’m sure you’ve all at least seen the chasm by now,” Dimitri starts carefully.

“I haven’t,” Linhardt drawls easily. “I was going to go look at it for research, actually. Has it disappeared yet?”

“_Lin_, shut up,” Lysithea hisses, elbowing his side, and Linhardt shrugs.

Dimitri coughs lightly. “Alright. I’m sure everyone, _ except _ Linhardt, has seen the chasm by now, then.”

It’s silent. All eyes are turned to him expectantly. Felix doesn't even so much as move from his spot, cross-legged.

“We will probably need to move,” Dimitri continues, “and fast. If it was a small pothole just last week, then we should pack up and leave.”

He’s really expecting protests and complaints, especially when they had finally found an empty, sustainable area to live in, but everyone seems either fine or only slightly discontent with this new revelation. On the other side of him, Annette sighs a little forlornly, and Sylvain just shrugs and yawns. “Where will we be going?” Petra asks.

Dimitri can’t help but glance at Felix when she asks this, but Felix just shrugs. “Wherever the road takes us,” Felix says dryly.

“Maybe we can go back to the city,” Annette ventures carefully, but Mercedes shakes her head.

“It’s too dangerous, Annie.”

“_Everything's_ too dangerous nowadays,” Annette mutters to herself. Dimitri can’t find it in him to protest against it, because she’s right.

Ingrid’s white jacket is already colored gray from snowflakes that refuse to melt as she stares at Dimitri. “So we’re just going to wander around for who knows how long again?” She asks. Her voice wavers as she adds, “What about food? Water?”

“We have water,” Felix snaps before Dimitri can properly fumble for an answer. “We’ll get more water from the spring before we leave, too. We have food. We can hunt. Don’t be so damn worried.”

“I have every right to be worried!” Ingrid says, sounding affronted. “We’ll have to ration even further.”

“Then we’ll _ ration_,” Felix spits out. Dimitri lays an arm on his leg and Felix slaps it off, ignoring the breath of polluted air Annette sucks in. “We’ll fucking ration. It doesn't matter. We either get out of there or we die from whatever the hell that _ thing _ is eating us up. There isn’t any time to sit around and worry about what we’ll be eating tonight, or tomorrow, or three weeks from now.”

It’s deadly silent for a moment. Ingrid’s eyes are piercing as she glares at Felix, a kind of bright blue that sucks in all the landscape’s color and gives it a little life even when she’s clearly frustrated. Eventually she must give up, because she shakes her head and mutters, “Whatever. It’s not like you help, anyway.”

Dimitri swears Felix’s hackles literally raise, but he mercifully stays silent. Dimitri clears his throat and looks hopefully around the rest of their circle. Dorothea has an arm around Petra, staring off into space. Lysithea’s holding hands with Cyril. They both look so young it sends a pang through his chest. Dedue and Ashe sit next next to each other, Ashe leaning into Dedue like he needs moral support, and Sylvain looks about two seconds away from falling asleep on Dedue. Dedue sits impassively, gazing at him determinedly, and Dimitri takes solace in that. “Are we all clear?” He asks. “Pack up today, and then we’ll head south.”

Everyone nods again, and the pseudo-meeting is adjourned. 

Felix turns to look at him with an unreadable look in his eyes as everyone leaves back to their own tents to gather supplies. “South?” He asks knowingly, raising a brow, and Dimitri smiles a small smile.

“Away from the chasm, isn’t it?”

“You’re right,” Felix says dryly, ignoring the hand Dimitri extends to him as he stands up. He knocks his head into Dimitri’s shoulder a bit playfully and it sends a rush of affection through him. “South is definitely away from _ the chasm_. But it’s also closer to something else, isn’t it?”

It is. Felix hates public displays of affection, but he doesn't move as Dimitri tilts his chin up with a finger and leans down to press their lips together. Felix’s lips are warm, soft, and he narrows his eyes when Dimitri pulls away. “We did say we should visit the coast sometime,” he says easily, and Felix smiles.

**+01**

Here’s the thing about the apocalypse: some effects are instant, and some are slow.

Dimitri’s on his balcony when the asteroid Artemis smashes into the moon. He’s all alone as he watches the moon knock itself closer to the Earth. The sight is so terrifying that he hears yells of shock and the cries of babies out on balconies like his across the neighborhood, and his heart flies into his throat as he runs back into the safety of his own room. The craters of the moon are more visible than they’ve ever been, and the thought sickens him in an uneasy, uncomfortable way. Dimitri tries to turn on the TV, but all he gets is static. He tries to call his father, but he doesn't even have a signal.

Mercedes is frantically tuning the radio as he runs downstairs. His father is out on a business trip in another country, along with his assistant, Felix’s older brother, and so Mercedes is staying with him. “This all feels so unnatural,” she says in her soft voice as Dimitri sits on the couch and runs a hand through his hair. “I’m a bit worried.”

“We should be optimistic,” Dimitri replies, though he isn’t feeling his own words. Mercedes fiddles with the radio for a little while longer until it finally comes to life through bits of static, so loud Dimitri can barely understand what they’re saying.

“We’ve got reports of high tides on the coast—monster tsunamis—millions could be dead all over the world—this is just an unverified report, however—”

Mercedes has her hands clasped so tightly they turn white with lack of blood flow, lips pursed. “This isn’t very good.”

“No, it isn’t,” Dimitri agrees. He isn’t sure how his voice manages to stay so level.

They end up going to find Felix, who looks just as frantic, standing outside of his house as he stares at his phone like it’ll suddenly start working for him. “Father’s worried sick,” he mutters, not meeting his eyes. “Who knows when your dad or Glenn will be able to contact us?”

Dimitri shakes at the thought. “Have you heard about the tides?”

Felix nods, dragging a hand over his face. “The world might as well be ending.”

“It might as well be,” Dimitri says quietly, a little listlessly as Felix drags him into his house.

Sylvain and Ingrid come over later, Ingrid looking terrified and Sylvain looking pensive as they try to get the TV and the radio to work to the best of their ability. “Father wants me back home,” Ingrid informs them. In the kitchen, Dimitri can hear Mercedes talking to Rodrigue in hushed tones and tries to quell his anxiety. “I think my family’s going to try to fly out.”

Felix scoffs. “Where the hell are you gonna go?” He asks, just as more static filters out from the radio. 

“—and it’s been confirmed that millions are dead on coastal cities. Tsunamis have rendered at least thirty percent of the country’s population deceased. Fatalities are on a larger scale than we’ve ever seen. We are encouraging everyone to stay inland—”

“We’re going to die,” Sylvain says flatly, and Ingrid punches him in the arm.

“Oh, god,” Dimitri murmurs to himself. He doesn't bother putting up an act of confidence in front of his three best friends, instead curling in on himself as Ingrid wraps a soothing arm around his shoulders. “What about Father? And Glenn?”

“They’ll be fine,” Felix says, but he doesn't sound very enthused by his own words. “If they’re okay, then we’ll be hearing from them as soon as they can get to us. For now, we should be as patient as possible.”

It’s so unlike Felix to be giving him any sort of soothing advice that Dimitri calms a little, relaxing against the cushions. “Alright,” he whispers, “alright.”

And so the world progresses into chaos.

After the tides come the loss of electricity, which is apparently enough to make the human race go mad with panic. Lines pile up at gas stations. Dimitri, Dedue, Sylvain and Felix raid a grocery store together and they stay at Felix’s house. Rodrigue leaves with the plan of contacting Dimitri’s father and never comes back.

His father and Glenn never come back, too. Dimitri holds hope for a while, but it’s inevitable.

The world descends into a sort of aching cold afterwards that leaves Dimitri’s joints in constant pain. The winter is eternal. Then underground volcanoes erupt, dragged forth by the moon’s gravitational pull, and spills into the air with pollution that renders one’s lungs useless if out for too long. 

They end up leaving the city afterwards, once it’s too dangerous. They end up dragging in other lost kids on accident, much to the chagrin of Felix—

“It’s every fucking man for himself, you know,” he snaps. This is after Dorothea and Petra join their ragtag group. Dimitri frowns.

“Don’t be so cruel.”

“Don’t be so _ cruel?_” Felix looks haunting in the moonlight. Dimitri knows he hates looking at the moon, so maybe it’s cruel of him to be standing right where Felix has to look at it if he doesn't want to meet Dimitri’s eyes. “The world is fucking ending, you idiot! Father’s dead. Glenn’s dead. Your dad’s dead. Who the fuck cares?”

“Just because they’re dead doesn't mean others should die without help too,” Dimitri tries to reason even as a sharp, aching pain runs through him clean like a butcher’s knife at the mention of everyone he’s lost. Everyone Felix has lost, too. 

This is two years after the fated collision. Felix glares at him for a moment, and Dimitri realizes that he just doesn't want to burden them all too much. That, and maybe food rations are already scarce. “Just be fucking careful,” he snaps, and then turns around to march back to where Sylvain is standing. Dimitri stares at the spot where Felix stood just to tell him off and wonders if love in this kind of world is really worth it.

_ and i love, too, that love soon might end / be known in its aching / shown in the shaking / lately of my wasteland, baby _

**+1467**

“Felix is sick,” Mercedes announces.

They’ve been trudging along a beaten down road for the past three days, Dimitri at the front and Felix leading the back. Mercedes has to jog up to him to get his attention, and Dimitri automatically beats himself up for not noticing, for being too in his own head to realize it.

“How bad is it?” He asks her. They continue walking. His bag is strapped on tight, heavy with supplies, but he ignores the back pain it gives him.

Mercedes worries her bottom lip. “Just a cold. But colds can be so dangerous these days.” She brushes some of her short hair away from her eyes. She had chopped it off only a year ago, and it makes her look more dangerous, more mature than Dimitri is used to, even now. “I think we should stop by nearest town and try to rest.”

She’s right, but it fills Dimitri up with frustration just thinking about it. Nowadays, a cold could be a death sentence if the right medications and the right professionals aren’t around. It isn’t snowing pure volcanic dust today, but it is cold, and he curses himself for being so reckless as he stops walking and signals for everyone to slow down too. “Is Felix still able to walk?”

Mercedes nods. “Yes, but I fear the fever will overtake him soon if we aren’t careful.”

“You’re right,” he mutters, and then turns around to the rest of the group. “We need to take a detour,” he announces, “to the nearest town or city. Just for a day or two.”

“It’s not like we have a deadline to meet or anything anyway,” Mercedes adds on cheerfully, “and I’m quite sure that sinkhole is far away from us by now.”

Both Dorothea and Sylvain turn around like they can spot it coming straight towards them, and then turn back with shrugs. “I’ll keep watch when we get there,” Sylvain volunteers, “Ashe, you coming?”

“Sure!” The gray-haired boy shuffles to stand next to him, and Dimitri lets Mercedes take the lead down the road in order to fall back until he’s walking alongside Felix. 

Felix doesn't bother with looking at him as he mutters, “I’m fine,” in a slightly nasally voice.

Dimitri rolls his eyes. “Sure.”

“I am,” Felix insists, trudging along. “Shut up,” he snaps, just for good measure, and Dimitri can’t help his laugh. It’s a sound that cuts through the tense, tired air, and he can’t ignore the way Felix’s eyes crinkle, the only part of his face he can see, covered by his mask and jacket. 

“I didn’t even do anything!” He protests lightly. “But you sound so congested, Felix. Maybe it’s better that we rest.”

“God, don’t tell me we’re only stopping because of me,” Felix says, stiffening. Ahead of them, Ingrid and Annette turn around to give them curious glances, and Dimitri waves them off. “I swear to god, boar, if you—”

That’s a nickname he hasn’t heard in a while, since the first months after the collision, and it makes his breath hitch. “It’s for the better,” Dimitri reasons anyway, and Felix punches his arm in retaliation. It doesn't do much, what with Dimitri’s padded jacket and Felix’s gloves and the fact that Felix is strong and Dimitri can take a hit but Felix pulls his punches on Dimitri anyway. “Don’t hit me! Is it so bad that I want to care for you?”

“Yes it is,” Felix snaps, and Dimitri hears the telltale venom in his voice, taking in the kind of tone that had weathered down over the years into the consistently dry tone Felix always speaks in now. It makes him figuratively step back and offer up his surrender instantly. “Stop fucking doting on me when we have more serious problems.”

It’s impossible to make Felix see his version of sense when they both communicate with total hits and misses like this, so Dimitri stays silent. It’s not as if Felix is hard to handle, of course. It’s just that they both have different ways of conveying their feelings. Even after years of playing together as children, years of struggling together as teenagers, and four years of suffering together like the last men standing as the world’s chapter slowly comes to a close, this has never changed. The thought grates on him until they finally make it to rest.

**+87**

“Ow!” Sylvain cries. “Ow, ow, shit! What the _ fuck_, Felix?”

“I told you not to touch the food,” Felix snaps. “We need to ration, you idiot.”

This is what Dimitri wakes up to on the eighty-seventh day after the beginning of the end. When he makes it downstairs without stumbling in the dim light, too tired and driven by the urge to conserve their flashlights as long as possible, he’s greeted with the sight of Felix standing protectively in front of a bunch of cans of peaches and a few bottles of water. Sylvain’s shaking his hand out and glaring emphatically at Felix. Sylvain’s wearing a gray hoodie and sweatpants, and he shoves his hands into his pockets as he argues, “We barely ever eat anymore, man.”

Felix sneers at him. “And you sure as hell don’t need food now if you’ve been surviving for the past however many days just fine, dumbass.”

“Don’t call me a dumbass,” Sylvain says heatedly, “I’m the one that gets all the firewood with Dimitri, and no one fucking ate dinner _ or _ lunch yesterday! Ashe’s stomach was growling the entire night.”

“Fuck if I care,” Felix spits out, and Dimitri is apalled at the heartlessness in his voice even as another part of him reminds him that he’s doing this out of a sense of urgency. Sylvain either sees it and ignores it or doesn't see it all as his face twists into something evil—Dimitri’s been seeing the same looks on everyone’s faces these days, and he doesn't know what to make of it. 

It’s as if everyone’s turning into their own sort of animal. A starved man will do that, he reasons, but it scares him all the same. 

“You are _ such a bitch_,” Sylvain snaps. Dimitri has to admit that’s probably not the best insult to go for, but it makes Felix’s eyes narrow all the same. “Fuck you, Felix.”

“Can we please calm down?” Dimitri speaks up weakly, but neither of them bother with listening to Dimitri, who stands at the foot of the stairs like a shadow. 

Sometimes he feels like he’s not really there, like he’s just watching everything play out. Like his existence doesn't really affect what’s going to happen. Felix clenches his fists and looks about two seconds away from swinging at Sylvain, and Sylvain glares back, and the tension just climbs and climbs until—

“What the hell are you guys _ doing?_” It’s Ingrid, marching down the stairs without a flashlight and almost stumbling on the last step. It does nothing to mask her anger, however, as she strides up to the two of them and stands in between them both, facing Sylvain. “Sylvain, what did you do now?”

“What the—” Sylvain starts with a scowl. “I didn’t even—!”

“Yeah, Sylvain,” Felix sneers from around Ingrid, “what’d you do this time, huh? I know we can trust you to mess it all up every time.”

“Felix,” Dimitri murmurs faintly, but Felix sends him a look that almost physically pins him to place and bares his teeth like an _ animal_. It’s funny how like understands like, really.

“Calm the hell down, Felix,” Ingrid says, and Felix laughs, an abrasive noise that sharpens the proverbial knife he’s holding in his hands. 

“Shut the hell _ up_, Ingrid,” he snaps back.

“Don’t talk to Ingrid like that,” Sylvain says hotly.

Felix ignores him. “All of you sit around and wallow in your damn emotions like a bunch of babies just out of the womb,” he says. “We can’t just eat when we want and cry when we want and complain when we want.” He directs it to Sylvain, but his gaze flies through all three of them. It hurts Dimitri a little, in a selfish way, to know some of that anger is directed towards him. “I’m sick of it. We need to move on from this hellhole of a city. But most of all, you need to grow up.”

“Grow up?” Sylvain laughs, the kind of laugh he used to give girls he never really cared for, girls Dimitri and Ingrid always reprimanded him for. It must have been weird, suddenly losing a large part of his personality like that—when the world starts to end, you don’t really have much time on your hands for girls and the like. But that isn’t the point, because Sylvain looks meaner and angrier than Dimitri’s ever seen him before. They’ve all gotten skinnier, but Sylvain’s hair is tousled and growing out and his shoulders are broader than ever from lugging firewood around, and it almost makes Dimitri scared for Felix. “You did not just tell me to _ grow up_. Say it again, will you?”

“Guys—” Dimitri starts, but no one’s listening.

Felix’s grin is almost maniacal. “Alright, Gautier. Grow the _ fuck _ up, will you?”

It’s almost impossible to detect how fast Sylvain flies at Felix, Ingrid jumping out of the way reflexively and then squeaking in shock as Sylvain crashes into Felix and sends the two of them tumbling over the table Felix had been so valiantly defending. The cans of food and bottles of water all to the ground in clangs and Felix lets out an animalistic shriek as Sylvain wrestles him down to the ground too. Dimitri doesn't even let himself think as he starts prying Sylvain off of him, Ingrid doing her best to separate the two while Sylvain tries to land a punch on Felix’s face. “You… shut the _ fuck _ up,” Sylvain growls, even as he lets Dimitri drag him away with an iron grip. “Shut the fuck up, Felix. You—you can’t keep acting like that.”

“Do you fucking see yourself?” Felix says, sitting up, voice coming out scratchy and desperate as he slaps Ingrid away from him. Dimitri watches with shock as a tear falls from his eyes. “You sneaking around for food isn’t going to help us at all! Us acting like we’re all a bunch of hormonal preteens isn’t going to get us anywhere!” His voice rises, going hysterical, and Dimitri just aches to reach out to him. His hair is a mess. “The world’s ending, and you’re getting angry over a small amount of food that won’t be doing you any good anyway. You don’t—you don’t get to _ act _ like that, when we need to be careful with what we have, you fucking idiot! You’re so—you’re so _ stupid_, why don’t you _ understand_—”

“It was for Ashe!” Sylvain yells, running his hands through his hair and staring wildly at Felix. “He doesn't ever fucking eat because of your dumbass rations, so he just tells himself he doesn't need it in the first place. I’m not being _ stupid_, I’m trying to be a good friend! Stop being so close minded about everything already!”

The mention of Ashe makes Felix slow down for a moment, blinking almost sluggishly at Sylvain, and then Dimitri next to him, and then Ingrid, who stands with her arms crossed. “I—I told him he could eat,” he stammers out.

Sylvain laughs bitterly. “You need to be more self-aware, then,” he snaps. “Fucking _ hell_, Felix. I’m sick of your bullshit. I’m fucking sick of it.”

“It’s not my damn fault,” Felix hisses, but he doesn't seem to have much else to say. Sylvain stares back at him for a moment before looking away.

“...Alright, then,” Ingrid speaks up. She has a scowl on her face and her black long-sleeved shirt slips off her shoulder like she’d thrown it on hastily. “Are we done yelling at each other?”

“We’re getting a bit out of control, you guys,” Dimitri adds on, and this time, everyone seems to be listening to him. “It’s a bit—well, it’s a bit… worrying.” He frowns, meeting Felix’s eyes when the younger boy looks up at him for a moment. “It’s hard to keep your brave faces on all the time, and I know food needs to be rationed carefully, but we also need to make sure we stay calm. It’s, what, five in the morning? Everyone’s tired. It’ll be a long day, as usual. Keeping temper is hard, but we need to at least try for each other.”

He can tell Felix wants to offer his unfiltered opinion on this, but he stays quiet, glaring hard at the floor. Sylvain sighs and runs a hand through his messy hair, shaking his head before standing up. He offers a hand to Felix but he ignores it in favor of getting up on his own. “Look, Felix,” Sylvain starts, “I’m sorry, man. I know I must’ve looked suspicious, and I should’ve just straight up told you what I was doing.”

Felix blinks up at him. “It’s… it’s whatever,” he says after a moment. “Uh, sorry for assuming things. You’re still an idiot.”

And then Sylvain narrows his eyes, looking back at Dimitri and jerking his thumb at Felix as if to say _ Look at this guy!_, right as he says, “Felix, this might be the first time I’ve ever heard you apologize to me.”

“Oh, shut the hell up,” Felix snaps as Dimitri chuckles and Ingrid rolls her eyes. “I hate you.”

“Love you too,” Sylvain says with a small smile. Something in his eyes is still guarded, so Dimitri knows this might not be over just yet, but he can hope.

“I’d really like to get back to sleep,” Ingrid speaks up. She shakes her head at Felix and Sylvain. “You two are such a disturbance. Dimitri, why didn’t you stop them earlier?”

That’s a good question. Dimitri winces. “Um—”

“He’s too much of a pussy for that,” Felix says for him with a smirk, and Dimitri’s jaw drops open affrontedly as Sylvain and Ingrid laugh.

“Now _ that _ was a good one,” Sylvain says.

“You guys are so rude,” Dimitri mutters.

Ingrid ends up dragging Sylvain back to their respective rooms—Sylvain rooms with Ashe and Ingrid sleeps by herself, courtesy of Felix’s house being so big. Dimitri used to think people would try and break into the house, but oddly enough, that hasn’t happened yet. Maybe they’re freaked out by a bunch of congregated teenagers living in one house.  
  
Dimitri abandoned his house long ago, taking his valuables and family memorabilia that Felix had sneered at him over, and as much as it ashames him—it had been his family home for as long as his dad’s been— _ was _—alive, but he likes the presence of other people, preferring it to his empty house. It’s probably been robbed by now, anyway. Not like they would find much. 

Felix keeps his own room but doesn't protest when Dimitri steps in after him. He doesn't even turn around as he says, “You gonna go back to sleep?”

His voice still hasn’t lost that desperate, shaky edge, and Dimitri grimaces. “Uh, yeah,” he starts carefully, “just… wanted to check up on you.”

Felix’s face in unreadable in the low light of his flashlight set off to the corner of his room. “I’m fine,” he says stiffly.

The world ending doesn't really give anyone much time to ponder relationships. Dimitri wasn’t ever really sure of what they were before, with kisses in between study dates and tentatively brushing their hands together on walks home from school before the collision, heated glances and heavy meanings afterwards. It hasn’t even been three months, technically, but Felix has become a completely new person in Dimitri’s eyes. He wonders if Felix feels the same about him. “You sure?” Dimitri asks.

Felix narrows his eyes. “Listen, boar,” he starts, venom dripping from his voice and leaving peppered out, steaming holes in whatever is left of Dimitri’s heart, “I don’t need you checking up on me all the damn time like I’m a child that needs watching from you. Leave me the hell alone unless you want to help me get firewood.”

His heart aches. “Of course,” he says slowly, “we should go do that now. I don’t think I could go back to sleep if I tried.”

Felix pauses, like he wasn’t actually expecting Dimitri to agree. “Whatever,” he mutters after a moment. “Go get your jacket.”

Dimitri resists the urge to smile at him and nods. “Alright,” he says as he starts out of Felix’s room and across the hall to his own, but not before stopping at the doorway and turning back to Felix, staring at him for a long moment.

“What do you want?” Felix snaps, but he’s fidgeting, brows pulling together.

Dimitri feels a faint smile ghost across his lips and doesn't miss the way Felix’s eyes gravitate towards his lips before snapping away quickly. “It’s nothing,” he says. “Just that I don’t check up on you out of obligation, but because I truly care about you.”

By the time Felix opens his mouth to answer, perhaps with a stutter or more snark, Dimitri’s already started off to his room. Felix doesn't follow after him.

_ be still, my indelible friend / you are unbreaking / though quaking, though crazy / that’s just wasteland, baby _

**+1467**

“What are the odds,” Ingrid says with a gasp, staring at the abandoned town Mercedes apparently deems safe to stay in for the night. Dimitri can’t tell what time of day it is from the deep gray clouds overhead and the way snow layers itself on the ground, but he’d guess somewhere in the afternoon, judging from when they finished packing up and left this morning.

“What is it, Ingrid?” Dorothea asks as she slings an arm over her shoulder. Her voice is muffled by the mask she wears, and Ingrid shakes her head.

“This is… this is my grandparent’s hometown. Wow, it’s been so long.”

“Oh, damn!” Sylvain exclaims. “I remember this place! We used to stay over at your grandparent’s house all the time, right?”

“Yeah,” Ingrid replies with a grin, “you, me, Dimitri and Felix.”

Dimitri gazes with wonder at the town he used to enjoy travelling to over school breaks as a child. It shares none of its original beauty anymore, streets hauntingly empty and buildings broken down and crumbling, but with the way Ingrid beams at everything, one would think she’d just travelled to a newly-built city she was excited to live in.

Next to him, Felix sneezes and then glares at Dimitri when he glances over at him in mild worry. “You used to flirt with Ingrid’s grandmother,” he drawls, addressing Sylvain, and the red-haired boy blanches.

“Shut up,” he hisses. “Those were different times!”

“You had been flirting with the grandmother of Ingrid?” Petra asks, sounding appalled by the revelation.

Ashe throws his head back to laugh. “Why am I not surprised in the slightest?”

“Abhorrent,” Lysithea mutters under her breath, and next to her, Cyril snickers.

“Oh, god,” Sylvain mumbles, covering his face with gloved hands as everyone’s laughs bounce of the empty town’s walls, save for Dedue, who has an exasperated look in his eyes.

Ingrid rolls her eyes. “You should be ashamed of yourself,” she says to him. “It was _ so _ embarrassing.”

“I remember your grandmother never seemed to be bothered by it, though,” Dimitri adds with a smile, and Ingrid makes a face of disgust as Felix fake retches.

It’s nice, to be able to hear laughter in times like this, with the immediate future so uncertain. They are all a bunch of young adults with their normal pasts behind them and no idea what to do with the now. He feels pity for the youngest in their group, Cyril and Lysithea, both whom had to watch everything be ripped away from them as young teenagers. _ At least I almost finished high school_, he thinks to himself. At least he had his share of firsts and heartbreaks and fun, instead of having to rely on these occasional fragmented pieces of happiness.

“D’you think we’d find anything if we went to your grandparent’s house, Ingrid?” Sylvain inquires, sounding hopeful. 

Ingrid thinks for a moment before she frowns. “I don’t know, actually,” she says softly, “I—do you think they’re even still there? I haven’t heard from them since… well, you guys obviously know.”

“Should we be getting our hopes up?” Dimitri ventures, because as much as he’d love to know the whereabouts of her grandparents, he isn’t quite sure how Ingrid would handle it if they weren’t there, or worse—if they’ve died yet. The thought sends a pang of worry through him. 

And then—“It’s been four years,” Felix points out, as cynical as ever. “I doubt they’re even alive.”

Ingrid stiffens at his words, and Sylvain winces. “Ouch, man. You could stand to be a little more sensitive.”

Felix rolls his eyes. “We could all stand to be a little more _ realistic_, actually.”

“I—I guess he’s right?” Annette speaks up, wringing her gloved hands together. “Well, I mean—not that I _ think _ they’re gone, or anything, I just—it’d be better… _ not _ to get our hopes up, maybe. Just a suggestion.” Then her eyes widen in sudden panic. “But if you wanna check it out, I don’t mind! That’s not what I was trying to say. I’ll come with! I’ll help you look—”

“Annie,” Felix says dryly, “be quiet, please.”

“Sorry!” Annette says with a nervous giggle. “I’ll be quiet. Yeah. Okay.”

Dimitri chuckles and then lets the noise die in his throat when he turns to Ingrid and catches sight of the frustrated tears in her eyes before she wipes them away. “You guys are right,” she says. Her voice shakes a little. “They probably aren’t there. I just… I wish I could’ve gotten a hold of them before everything happened.”

“Oh, Ingrid,” Dorothea and Mercedes say at the same time, pity mirrored perfectly in each other’s eyes.

Ingrid’s laugh is a little choked out, like she has to force it out through layers of pain, and Dimitri hates how he can relate to her in this moment. “Guys, I’m fine.”

“You sure, honey?” Dorothea asks, wrapping her up in a hug made awkward by their huge jackets. “This is—well, it’s hard every time, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Ingrid says hoarsely, burying her face in Dorothea’s shoulder. “It’s… it’s pretty damn hard, I guess.”

The atmosphere is solemn now. Dimitri thinks about how Ingrid had a choice between staying with them or going with her family and chose her childhood friends, knowing her family was heading to their own doom. He remembers her crying at night, just like the rest of them. And yet she’s always been so earth-shakingly strong in the face of her suffering, so maybe he should be more like her. Next to him, Felix sighs.

“We can check your grandparent’s house if you want,” he says.

Dimitri frowns. “You’re sick, Felix. You aren’t going anywhere until you get better.”

“Don’t fucking—are you _ serious?_” Felix snaps, and then launches himself straight into a coughing fit so hard he doubles over. “F-fuck off, idiot,” he hisses when Dimitri leans down to support him, and Dimitri rolls his eyes. 

“Let’s go find somewhere to rest, everyone. I don’t think it’s safe to just be standing out here.”

“It feels so abandoned,” Dedue murmurs. “What could possibly be in this place?”

“For starters,” Felix snaps, trying to shove Dimitri’s arms off from where they settle over his shoulders and pitifully failing, “my fist up Dimitri’s ass, maybe?”

“No objections,” Sylvain says with a grin, and Dimitri resists the urge to laugh.

**+104**

“Shut the hellup already, you animal,” Felix hisses for possibly the millionth time that night. “You have to be quiet. Is that so hard?”

“S-sorry,” Dimitri stutters, eyes flying shut, and Felix sighs. His fingers come up to press Dimitri’s thighs apart, purposefully pressing into the bruises he’d just created, and Dimitri whimpers a bit pathetically, throwing his head back against the pillow and gritting his teeth. “God, you—y-you’re so mean.”

“What, really?” Felix drawls. He sounds uninterested even as his gaze hungrily rakes up and down Dimitri’s body. “I had no idea, but thanks for telling me.”

Dimitri resists the urge to cover his face with his hands out of sheer embarrassment, because he knows Felix would just hold him down. Not like he’s strong enough to overpower Dimitri, but perhaps what makes this even more embarrassing is that if he tried, Dimitri would let him. He would bend to his every will without a second thought.

It’s an arrangement of sorts that started only a few week ago but already seems to be escalating faster than Dimitri can handle. What was soft kisses and tentative brushes of fingers before the end has turned into Felix mouthing at the column of his neck as he grinds his ass down on Dimitri’s leaking dick, making him gasp and curl his fingers into Felix’s long hair. “You’re always on edge,” Felix murmurs into his ears, and Dimitri shivers at the rasp in his voice. “Don’t you think you’re kind of pathetic?”

“Aren’t you pathetic for giving into me, then,” is what Dimitri says back, whining when Felix sucks a harsh mark into the base of his throat in retaliation. “Can I—can I, um...?”

Felix sneers down at him as he sits back up again, his hair falling down over his shoulders in gorgeous waves. “Can you what?” He snaps. “Spit it out. Don’t be _ shy_.”

But the thing is, Dimitri is still unsure of what he’s allowed to do, and what he’s allowed to say. It’s almost as if this new Felix is a complete stranger to him despite them being friends since they were kids, and he’s always been a bit abrasive—but this Felix can get to be downright cruel, and Dimitri does not want to say something that could ruin what they have… whatever it is they have. 

One could ask Dimitri to name Felix’s goals and aspirations, and he would be at a loss for words. And yet he could point out every single beauty mark on his skin as if his body’s the sky and all of his imperfections are stars making themselves at home there. He could picture every time Felix’s lips have pressed against the curve of his hip with perfect clarity, could call up every memory he’s ever had of Felix on him like this already even though it’s only been a few weeks. It’s twisted in a sad, lonely sort of way, because Felix and Dimitri are both just barely adults, and yet they will likely never know the beauty of first love together.

But he is learning to push those melancholic thoughts out of his head. So instead, he focuses on the way Felix looks down at him, something fiery flickering in his gaze and sending a molten-hot spark up his spine at the feeling of Felix grinding down on him slowly again. The kindhearted, sentimental Dimitri wants to ask why things couldn’t be better between them, but the Dimitri of now—the Dimitri that has lost his father, Glenn, and perhaps even Felix—doesn’t bother. He takes what he wants, and Felix takes it back in equal measure.

_ and the day that we watch the death of the sun / that the cloud and the cold and those jeans you have on / that you gaze unafraid as they sob from the city roofs _

**+1470**

Ingrid adamantly refuses to check her grandparent’s house until the final day of their stay, when Mercedes deems Felix well enough to move around. She only goes once Sylvain agrees to go along with her and no one else, and Dimitri sends them off with hopes that they won’t find anything bad there.

Of course, Dimitri has always had the worst of luck, so maybe he should’ve kept his thoughts far away from Ingrid.

Because when they get back, Ingrid’s eyes are red, and Sylvain looks more serious than Dimitri’s ever really seen him look. “We… found them there,” he murmurs to Dimitri. “They—well, we couldn’t even get inside, the stench was so bad.”

“Oh, god,” Dimitri says, grief wrapping his heart up in a cruel vice grip as Ingrid disappears into her room with Mercedes. “I can’t even imagine how hard it must’ve been for her to see that.”

“I know,” Sylvain whispers. “I know. But she’s so strong. I don’t even think I could’ve been able to handle it. Everyone we know is dead by now. It’s enough to drive people crazy just thinking about it.”

He’s right, but he doesn't want Sylvain starting down that train of thought. “We still have each other, Sylvain. Don’t forget that.”

Sylvain searches his gaze, looking listless for a moment, and Dimitri sees the child in Sylvain that used to chase the three of them around the house, the one that used to let Dimitri and Felix cry on his shoulder before making hot chocolate and letting them watch _ Star Wars_. Sylvain is only older than them by almost two years, tops, but Dimitri realizes he’s never truly gotten his time as a _ kid _ with them. Especially with Miklan—but as soon as Dimitri’s mouth opens to talk about it, Sylvain’s expression shutters off like he knows what’s coming, and he smiles.

“Thanks, Dima,” he says. “I hope you remember that we’re always here too.”

And then he trudges off, heading straight for Ashe and Petra.

“You suck at taking your own advice, you know,” is what Felix says when Dimitri heads up to his room to tell him about it. He doesn't say it in the sort of accusatory tone he probably knows would make Dimitri rush to apologize. “Reminding yourself that we have friends who are alive when you yourself spent two years only acknowledging the dead.”

“I am past that, Felix,” Dimitri replies.

Felix scoffs. He’s lying down, shivering almost pitifully despite Mercedes declaring him safe—and really, nothing Felix does could ever be described as _ pitiful_—as he sneezes and sniffles and then says, “I wouldn’t say you’re a hundred percent there, but I know.”

“Thank you for that acknowledgement,” Dimitri says dryly, and Felix huffs out a little chuckle that makes Dimitri wish he could lean over and kiss him without running the risk of falling ill. He’s likely running the risk of that just by being in here.

But Felix is right—the point of it is, they’re all at least a little traumatized, but Dimitri sometimes wonder if there is something just _ wrong _ with him. After he’d given up on his father and Glenn and Rodrigue ever coming home, he’d found himself quickly regressing—unable to process his emotions, unable to understand what he was going through. And so he let a little cruel beast grow in the cavities of his heart instead.

“Hey.” Felix snaps him out of that line of thinking with just his voice. Dimitri must look solemn, because he sighs and says, “Listen. I’m proud of you, okay? I won’t ever fucking say that again, so you better be listening to me. “He sneezes, and it’s so endearing Dimitri can’t help but smile. “Fuck, off,” Felix says, but there’s no heat behind it.

“Thank you, Felix,” Dimitri says softly, “_God_. I wish I could kiss you.”

“If you try, I’ll just sneeze in your face,” Felix says flatly.

“I love you so much,” Dimitri says helplessly, wringing his hands together, and Felix sighs.

“You,” he announces, “are so fucking pathetic.” And then his soft, caramel eyes, warmed only further by the candlelight, flicker up to meet his gaze before they flit away just as quickly. “But I love you too. Idiot.”

Just then there’s a squeal as Annette skids past their room. There’s a loud crash and a yelp of pain before she manages to poke her head in, eyes bright. “Guys, guess what? We found a piano and a guitar in the back room!”

Dimitri raises an eyebrow. “Really now?”

Felix stretches out all catlike on the bed, and Dimitri has to physically tear his eyes away from the way his deep blue sweatshirt rides up over toned abs and pale skin, blushing furiously when Annette wiggles her eyebrows at him with a knowing smirk. “Who cares,” Felix drawls, and Annette sighs.

“Don’t be like that, Felix!” She exclaims with a pout. “Won’t you come downstairs? Impromptu song night!”

“Yeah, Felix,” Dimitri says, smiling innocently when Felix gives him a sharp glare. “Impromptu song night, and all.”

“Fuck both of you,” Felix mutters, but he sits up anyway, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed. He doesn't even growl or slap his hands away when Dimitri helps him up, so this is definitely a win-win.

When they get down to the main commons room, there’s already a fire going, and Dedue’s sitting at the piano, dusting it off and holding in his sneezes as best as he can. Petra’s got the guitar, a pretty, worn-down old thing that she tries her hardest to tune with utmost concentration. Dorothea sits next to her, an awed sort of look in her eyes. “Petra, I didn’t know you were a guitar kinda gal!” She says, sounding quite satisfied with this development.

“I have not been playing that much,” Petra admits. “I have had a friend—his name was Ferdinand. He used to be teaching me how to play when free time was… when we had free time?” she clears her throat, and Dorothea nudges her along with a soft, encouraging smile. “I have not seen Ferdinand since the moon was moving closer to us. I… miss him.”

“Oh, sweetheart,” Dorothea says sympathetically, leaning in to give Petra a hug, and Petra offers her a wobbly smile. “Do you wanna play for us? I can sing!”

“Oh! Oh!” Annette exclaims. “Once you guys are done, can I sing while Dedue plays?”

Dimitri sits down next to Felix, who wraps himself up in blankets and adamantly refuses to share. “I have no objections,” he announces despite protesting against coming downstairs in the first place, which Dimitri thinks describes so much of Felix’s personality perfectly well, at least when Annette is involved.

Annette claps and grins. “Yay!”

“I think this calls for some of our precious hot chocolate stash, yes?” Mercedes asks them all cheerily, and everyone yells their agreement, besides Ingrid, who sits at the foot of the couch. Her red-rimmed eyes meet Dimitri’s and she gives him a warm, albeit tired smile. And then Mercedes leans down to kiss her forehead before going off to find the aforementioned hot chocolate, and Ingrid goes a shade of red that Dimitri decidedly can’t blame on the glow of firelight.

It’s nice to know his friends have each other, he thinks, as Mercedes comes back with their drinks—even Felix drinks it gratefully, despite vehemently hating sweets. “It’s a bit bitter, actually,” Felix says flatly when Dimitri teases him about it.

“Mm, sure,” Dimitri smiles down at him. “Anyway, how could you hate sweets? _ I’m _ sweet, aren’t I?”

It’s coming from someone who can’t even taste, so Dimitri bursts out laughing when Felix fake retches so hard he accidentally jerks Linhardt out of his sleep-induced stupor from where he’d been lying next to them. “Sorry, Lin,” Felix says almost sheepishly, and Linhardt frowns.

“The dream was just getting good, you know,” he says, before he settles back down on the cushions and promptly knocks out again.

Felix blinks at him for a moment before shrugging. In front of them, Lysithea and Cyril mock slowdance, casting wild shadows over over the walls. Dedue and Ashe play the piano together while Petra strums out chords on the guitar that oddly match the tone of the piano, eyes closed as she loses herself in the music. Annette’s teaching Dorothea her silly songs about _ crumbs and yums _ and _ steaks and cakes_, Dorothea giggling all the way and doing her best to sing along in her own soothing, honey-like voice, and Mercedes leans her head on Ingrid’s shoulder, their fingers intertwined, and Dimitri thinks that if the moon decided to be cruel and take his life right now, he’d be content. He would die for it overwhelmed with so much love in his chest, his mouth, his fingertips, that his body would disintegrate right along with him.

**+211**

“Hey, loser,” is what Felix says as Dimitri comes back in, dragging his feet tiredly after Sylvain. “Happy fucking birthday, or whatever.”

Dimitri’s cheeks and lips sting so much from the cold that he can’t even respond for a moment. Ingrid looks up from where she’d been reading Harry Potter with wide eyes. “Oh my gosh, really?” she exclaims. “Happy birthday, Dima!”

“Thank you,” Dimitri manages to slur out once he manages to get his mask and gloves off, and Felix smirks at him in response.

Sylvain doesn't seem to be faring much better than Dimitri, immediately blowing on his hands once he drops his gloves on the ground and kicks them away. They’d gotten all the firewood they needed for the next few weeks just this morning, so he’s surprised they aren’t about to collapse. “Dude, holy shit,” Sylvain says. “Why didn’t you tell us?” And then he narrows his eyes at Felix. “Matter of fact, how is _ he _ the one remembering this? Felix, no offense, but you don’t give a fuck about birthdays.”

“Don’t _ no offense _ Felix,” Ingrid says disapprovingly as she slides her bookmark into her book. “He doesn't deserve that kind of politeness. Keep offending him, Sylvain.”

“Shit. You’re absolutely right, Ingrid,” Sylvain says seriously, and Felix looks ready to drop-kick his bowl of oatmeal.

“Will the two of you _ shut the fuck up _ already?” Felix hisses. “But you’re right. I didn’t remember. Annette told me last night.”

A part of Dimitri feels crestfallen that Felix didn’t actually remember, but really, he has no right to feel like that, because—”In truth, I didn’t even know it was my birthday,” he says honestly. “I’m surprised Annette is even keeping track.”

“Annie’s a good friend like that,” Ingrid points out.

“Yeah,” Sylvain says, a smirk growing on his face—it’s the kind that entails nothing good is going to come out of whatever he says next. “I mean, but did Felix remember _ your _ birthday, Ingrid? Annie must’ve told him then, too, but he didn’t say anything.”

“You—_what?_” Felix sputters while Dimitri suddenly starts to feel hot, despite spending a ridiculous amount of time out in below-freezing temperatures just moments ago. “You… you...!” He’s going comically red, and Dimitri can’t quite believe it’s for him.

“Me! _ Me!_” Sylvain says, wide-eyed. “Damn, what a good speech. Really felt that, man.”

Felix inhales deeply, nostrils flaring, and Dimitri decides to cut in before Felix spontaneously combusts. “Okay, guys,” he says. “Um, thanks for the birthday wishes! Let’s not kill each other on my birthday, please?”

“Aww,” Sylvain says, voice saccharine-sweet. “Felix’ll listen to you, won’t you, Felix?”

Dimitri doesn't exactly remember the next few minutes because his brain goes into fight-or-flight mode (AKA Felix is Trying to Kill Sylvain and We Can’t Have That Happen Just Yet, also known as FTKSWCHTHJY, courtesy of one of Annette’s not-so-genius moments) as he and Ingrid have to practically drag an extremely pissed-off Felix away from a laughing-his-ass-off Sylvain.

“You didn’t have to say any of that,” Ingrid hisses at him afterwards. Her hair’s practically unbraided itself after Felix yanked off her hair ties in a fit of what Ingrid calls misogynistic rage, and she has her hands on her hips. “You didn’t have to fucking _ say _ any of that.”

“Oh, yes I did,” Sylvain grins. “That made my week. By the way, you look like a terf.”

(This prompts the exact same sequence of events to repeat, except now it’s Dimitri on his own while Felix angrily eats his oatmeal at the dining room table and violently chokes on his water when Ingrid manages to land a kick to Dimitri on somewhere that definitely should not be kicked ever.)

“Well, this is how all birthdays are after the apocalypse,” Ashe says wisely when Dimitri complains to him about it. “Entropy, and all that. You know.”

“What the—” Dimitri makes a face. “Ashe, that doesn't even make any _ sense_. We made chocolate cake for your birthday, remember?”

“I’m a Libra,” is Ashe’s simple explanation, leaving Dimitri to stew over where he went wrong with being born a Sagittarius.

But later that night, Felix sits in his room with Dimitri. Felix has already seemed to cool down a little. They’d fucked, and instead of Felix keeping insistent on pushing Dimitri out of his room, he let him stay. “Only because it’s your birthday,” he yawns out when Dimitri pokes at him tentatively about it.

Dimitri snorts. “Is this your birthday present for me?”

Felix blinks up lazily at him. “Mm, sure,” he says. “Whatever. Is this an ideal birthday present for you?”

“Of course,” Dimitri says, smiling at him. “Probably because it’s you, you know.”

He kindly ignores the way Felix goes a little red at that. “Shut up,” Felix mutters. “Your birthday present always used to be us going to the beach together, remember?”

Dimitri remembers. He stares out the window and up at the clouds, which congregate and spill snowflakes out into the sky. “Wouldn’t it be great if we could see the sea again?” He asks, a little wistfully, and Felix makes a small noise at the back of his throat.

“That’s dumb.”

“Let me be a little idealistic,” Dimitri says. “It’s my birthday, remember?”

“Bah, whatever,” Felix mutters. “Go to the coast, then. Who’s stopping you?”

“I will,” Dimitri promises. “One day, we’ll all go. I think we’d like to pay our respects there as well.”

So many deaths, and so many memories tied to this wasteland of a world, to the stench of the sea and the absence of green. Felix snuggles in a little closer to Dimitri and says, “Alright, I guess,” and that’s it, really.

_ wasteland, baby / i’m in love, i’m in love with you _

**+1475**

The coast is so beautiful it takes Dimitri’s breath away. It’s almost paradoxical in its simplicity for two reasons—because it takes him back to when he was seven years old, making sandcastles for Glenn to compliment and Ingrid to inevitably end up accidentally stepping on, and because the tides are what he suspects took his father and Glenn.

Felix had told him Rodrigue was probably killed by thieves sniffing for money in the flattest voice he could muster up, but by the way he stiffens up now next to him, Dimitri figures it wasn’t as easy to deal with as he made it out to be. And then he flinches at that thought, because of _ course _ it was hard for Felix to lose both his father and Glenn. He berates himself for being so selfish even now.

“Not to be a scientist or anything,” Annette announces. “But just so you guys know, the tides don’t rise anymore. You’d think they would, but they’ve swallowed up so much of the land already.”

“This is the world in its equilibrium after the moon forced it to change,” Linhardt adds.

“So many people were drowned within the first few days,” Ashe whispers, peering out into the water. “There must be entire lost cities underneath the sea.”

The waves crash against rocks and dirt. There are no seagulls. There is no sunshine, and yet the air is crisper here than anywhere they’ve ever been. The clouds are a little lighter here instead of their usual dark-gray tint. But most of all, it smells like the sea, still, oddly enough.

“I have always been wanting to visit the sea,” Petra says. “It is… beautiful, even now. My family used to be speaking of the sea spirits and the flame spirits that my people were worshiping. The sea has a life of its own, does it not?”

“Of course,” Dedue murmurs. “The sea gives and takes away life as it so wishes.”

There’s a small, coastal town up on a hill—it’s less of a town and more of just squeezed-in houses and tents, which makes Dimitri think it’s actively being lived in. They approach it anyway, with caution. They have weapons, of course, but it probably isn’t a smart idea to take any of them out when they’re walking up a hill to what might end up being a den full of hostile attackers.

But by the time they get up there, a young man is already standing alone, a hand in his pocket and the other cocked at his hip. The first thing Dimitri notices is the crossbow strapped to his back—and then he notes the inherent youthfulness to his face, his flawless chocolate skin, his glittering emerald green eyes that look over them all calculatingly. He’s wearing a silky black shirt that Dimitri thinks really shouldn’t exist in this timeframe, and black jeans. He gives them a cold smile that doesn't reach his eyes, and Dimitri almost finds him frightening. “I hope you aren’t here to kill us,” he says, voice smooth.

_ Of course not_, is what Dimitri starts to say, but then Sylvain cuts him off with an undignified squeak as he exclaims, “Fucking—_Claude?!_”

The young man—Claude—blinks, clearly taken a back as he stares at Sylvain for a moment before his eyes widen in realization. “Shit, Sylvain!” He says, a grin blooming on his face. “It’s been a while, man. The years have been good to you.”

Sylvain smirks, running his hands through his hair, although he looks—_flustered? _ “You as well,” he says right back. “Everyone, this is Claude. He… well, we met back when college was still a thing.”

“You guys fucked, you mean,” Felix says flatly next to him.

Claude barks out a laugh. Dimitri supposes he sees why Sylvain would be attracted to him. He’s gorgeous in a could-murder-you-and-get-away-with-it kind of way, which admittedly fits Felix as well. “I like this one,” Claude says, before his eyes settle back on Dimitri. “But that isn’t the point. Your group just shows up here and decides to come up to a place of residence, which I’m sure you know is dangerous these days. So what’s up?”

“We—” It’s admittedly hard to speak with Claude’s gaze so heavy on him, but Dimitri clears his throat and steels himself. So what if Claude has a crossbow strapped to his back?

Okay, that doesn't help much. His voice fails him again and Felix sighs, exasperated as he takes over for him.

“We found a place to stay, but there’s some sort of chasm that started out as a sinkhole. We decided to move.” His eyes are stormy as he glares at Claude. “Gonna try to kill us now?”

“Those chasms…” Claude looks lost in thought for a moment. "We've heard news of them, actually. I'm assuming you guys settled down a ways away from here?"

"Yeah," Ingrid says with a nod. She looks suspicious, although she must know they don't really have another choice at the moment. "How'd you get word of them, though?"

"There's another camp further south of here," Claude says easily. "Their little leader's name is Edelgard. She's got even less people than the both of us, but they're, uh... well, they can definitely hold their own."

"Edelgard..." Petra says, staring at the sky in concentration, before she gasps. "Wait! Is there a boy named Ferdinand who is staying with Edelgard, perhaps? I know of Edelgard—she was always kind to me at school. She and Ferdinand used to be of rivals to each other."

Claude squints and then snaps his fingers in realization. "Yeah, there is, actually. It's Edelgard, Bernadetta, Hubert, Caspar and Ferdinand down there."

Tears well in Petra's eyes as she leans into Dorothea. "I thought he was gone," she murmurs, and Dorothea wraps her arms around her silently.

"Caspar’s my best friend, actually,” Linhardt drawls with a smile. “I’d definitely like to see him again.”

Claude blinks. “Well, this is a reunion for the ages, huh?”

And then—“Um, Lysithea?” A girl says. She’s blue-haired with nearly faded out eyebags and a wobbly little smile as she pokes her head out of the nearest tent. “I-is that you?”

“Marianne?!” Lysithea exclaims with a gasp. “I—I haven’t seen you in years!” Cyril grasps her arm in a silent warning when the young girl looks like she’s about to run off towards her, and Lysithea holds herself back with a glance at Claude, who’s nostrils flare as he inhales.

“Uh, okay,” he says. “This definitely isn’t what I was expecting. But that isn’t the point here.”

“You’re right,” Dimitri agrees. “Let’s… maybe calm down, guys. We can catch up with old friends later.” He meets Claude’s eyes. “The truth of it is, we need a place to stay. We’re not saying you have to _ give _ us a place, of course, but… if we could hang around here for a bit, that would be great.”

Lysithea glares at Claude, her hands curling into fists. “You _ better _ let us stay here. I sure as hell am _ not _ moving when I’ve finally found a friend I haven’t seen in forever!”

“I would also like to stay,” Linhardt says slowly, “with Edelgard, of course. I have a few years to catch up on with my old friend over there. Right, Petra?”

“Of course!” Petra smiles, fingers interlocking with Dorothea’s. “Dorothea will have to be coming with me, however. If that is to be allowed.”

Dorothea blinks uncomprehendingly at Petra, before her cheeks start tinting red and a small smile blooms over her face. “Of course,” she promises, before turning her eyes on Claude. “You wouldn’t deny us that, would you now?”

Claude’s eye twitches. His brows furrow together as he drags a hand over his face, and he sighs. “I never had any specific objections,” he points out. “Just that having too many young adults and teenagers congregating in the same area could invite some… unwanted attention, as isolated as we are over here.” He glances up at Dimitri, an unreadable look in his eyes. “This doesn't mean I trust you, because I don’t. But I suppose no one’s stopping you, either.”

“Claude?” A pink-haired girl with a black and pink frilly dress comes up to stand next to Claude, eyeing them all carefully. She looks delicate but deadly in an odd sort of way, and Dimitri wonders just what the hell goes on with these people. “What’s up? Thought you said you’d deal with them quickly.”

“_Deal with us?_” Felix hisses, his hand instinctively coming up to a dagger he’d strapped to the hilt of his belt.

Claude groans. “_Hilda_, I told you not to talk about that,” he mutters, before flashing a disarming smile at Felix that does absolutely nothing to disarm him. “It’s nothing. We saw you guys coming and I decided to handle it.”

Hilda snorts, a hand coming up to twirl her hair in her fingers. “Don’t be so cruel,” she scolds, “We’ve been keeping an eye on those chasms, but ever since we caught you guys heading towards us, we’ve been keeping an eye on you as well. No ill intention, of course!” She says it in the kind of tone that suggests that there’s probably some ill intention somewhere, but perhaps Dimitri is too nice, because he decides to give her the benefit of the doubt. “You gotta understand, this has been our home for quite a while now. We haven’t seen anyone come over in a pretty long damn time too, so we’re skeptical.”

“Still feels like you want us dead,” Felix mutters even as he releases his hold on the dagger.

“Actually, you’re the one with the dagger,” Claude points out easily.

Felix narrows his eyes. “Well, _ you’re _ the one with the crossbow!”

“Do you want him to use it?” Hilda asks cheerily, like she’s asking when dinner is, and Dimitri panics.

“Let’s not!” He shouts unnecessarily loudly, judging by the way Felix startles next to him. “Let’s not do that. In fact, let’s never show each other how our weapons work. That would be great.”

Both Claude and Hilda laugh as though he’d just suggested something absolutely absurd, before Claude gets himself together and says, “Of course. I guess you guys are welcome to settle here, as long as you don’t harm any of us directly, because that would be _ not good _ and, as you said, I don’t really want to use my crossbow on you guys.” He winks at Sylvain, who blushes in response, a sight so bizzare Dimitri briefly wonders if he’s having a fever dream. “Wouldn’t want to mar this one’s pretty face.”

“Oh, stop,” Sylvain demurs.

Ingrid looks as if she’s about to vomit. “I don’t think I can do this, guys.”

So that’s how it goes. They bid farewell to Linhardt, Petra and Dorothea before the night’s end, Dorothea with tears in her eyes as she throws her arms around Ingrid. “I’ll miss you so much,” she cries, and Ingrid squeaks.

“Dorothea, we aren’t far from each other,” she points out.

Dorothea lets out an aborted sob. “Still!”

Both Lysithea and Cyril elect to stay with Claude, who doesn't seem to mind as he ruffles Cyril’s hair. “Aw, are you guys together?” He teases, which apparently is the fastest way to fluster Lysithea, save for spooking her.

“Shut up!” She snaps. “You’re not making a very good impression on me, you know.”

“Yes, we are,” Cyril answers calmly for her, and Claude guffaws.

Later, as the sun starts to rise over the horizon, clouds lightening, Felix and Dimitri stand out on the rocks together. Dimitri can’t sleep and so can’t Felix, apparently. He looks out behind him at endless plains surrounding them, and wonders if the chasms will reach them this far out, or if they all will end some other way.

The moon is so close to the rising sun in the sky that it could kiss it a good morning if it so wished. The waves crash on the shore, and Felix says, “Things will never go back to normal, will they?”

“Mm,” Dimitri hums, hooking his chin over Felix’s shoulder. “Probably not, but that’s fine. We’ve found a home, haven’t we?”

It’s sad, because Dimitri feels like he had actual dreams and aspirations. He wanted to become a lawyer, he thinks, and help the orphan kids living on a corner a few streets down from his old house. He liked tutoring them in math and physics, two of the subjects he felt genuinely confident in. He knows Felix wanted to go into computer science. He knows Felix probably wanted to fall in love the conventional way, too, if at all, and it hurts like a knife to the heart knowing they won’t ever get it. 

Felix leans his head back on Dimitri’s shoulder in a rare show of vulnerability, sighing. “Sure,” he says. “What would a romantic like you say about this?”

“I’d say you’re the moon, and I’m the earth,” Dimitri laughs, holding on tight to Felix’s waist when he tries to pull away in disgust. “I’m _ kidding___. I’d say… well, I’m happy you’re here with me, Felix. I’m not sure I could’ve made it this far without you.”

“Guess so,” Felix mumbles. “I suppose… you aren’t a waste of space.”

“I suppose you’re the love of my life,” Dimitri teases back, and Felix groans even as he turns around in Dimitri’s hold to loop his arms around his neck. In the background, he can hear Annette and Sylvain cheering them on, but Dimitri elects to ignore them.

The world is a wasteland, but it’s theirs now. Dimitri leans in and kisses Felix like it’s their last day on earth, which he knows it very well could be.

**Author's Note:**

> i don't exactly know why my dimilex fics spiral out of control like this but this was fun to write! i explored more with this whole melancholic nonlinear writing style, it being smth i'm still not 100% used to going for, so i apologize if things seem inconsistent. at the same time, though, it's supposed to be at least a little ambiguous as well.
> 
> comments + kudos are forever appreciated ;; thank you sm for reading and hopefully enjoying! + i didn't realize this until i was 8k words in but the little ragtag group dimitri leads is actually everyone i recruited in my azure moon route save for cyril. i got them all in quick succession before i inevitably hit the brick wall that is, unfortunately, ferdinand von aegir
> 
> come talk to me on twitter (@_fraldarius)!


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